


The Heaviness We've Known

by rimahadley



Category: Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood & Manga
Genre: Background Riza Hawkeye/Rebecca Catalina, Bad Parenting, Canon Compliant, Gen, Guilt, Has a Happier Ending than the Tags Imply, Hospitalization, Mentions of Mass Murder (Canon-Typical), Mentor Riza Hawkeye, Post-Promised Day
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-18
Updated: 2020-07-18
Packaged: 2021-03-05 10:22:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,704
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25349167
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rimahadley/pseuds/rimahadley
Summary: While they're in the hospital after the Promised Day, Edward Elric visits Riza's room, needing someone to talk to. Conversations about murder, guilt, and complicated feelings about complicated fathers follow.
Relationships: Edward Elric & Riza Hawkeye
Comments: 10
Kudos: 37





	The Heaviness We've Known

**Author's Note:**

> Additional warnings: There are some implications of backstory child abuse, in the paragraphs where Riza is discussing her father.

Edward shrugged his left shoulder. “Yeah, the doctors freaked out about me using my arm with the automail nerve implants still in my shoulder. Well, I guess they were also freaking out about the whole situation. It’s not exactly like there’s a precedent for someone getting their original arm back after they had an automail replacement. But anyway, I’m not allowed to move it at all until they decide the rest of me is healed enough for shoulder surgery.” He stared down at his right hand, the only part of his arm outside the sling. Riza would have replied, but she had the feeling he was almost ready to talk about what he’d really come here for, and that right now he just needed someone to listen, and to understand.

“I killed Father.” And there it was. “Hohen– my d– Hohenheim told us, back when we first entered the tunnels, that we needed to destroy his container, that it was the only way to stop him. That he couldn’t live without it. So I knew, even if I didn’t want to think about it. And then, when he was dying, I was just angry, and terrified, and he’d hurt and killed so many people, and he’d killed Greed, and _Al was gone_. So I told him to go back to nothingness, and I watched him die. I’ve tried and tried and I can’t think of another way I could have stopped him, and if anyone deserved to die he did, and there was no other way to free the people from Xerxes he was using, but all that just feels like I’m trying to justify it to myself. It’s like when I was trapped in Gluttony’s stomach with Ling and Envy, and... and I used Envy’s stone as the toll to get out. They said the souls in it could never become human again. They said I had to use logic to determine what a human is. And I spent days afterwards trying to convince myself of that and all I managed was to make myself feel sick.” For the first time since he’d entered the room, he looked up at her. “I’m… I’m sorry for asking this. You don’t have to answer if you don’t want to. But you told me about Ishval, and I couldn’t think of anyone else to talk to, so I’m asking you.” He shrugged one-shouldered again, looking back down. “How did you… deal with it, the first time you killed someone?”

This wasn’t going to be easy. “Edward, the first thing I want you to understand is that killing someone like the Homunculus, someone who is trying to kill and use countless innocent people, is not the same thing as what I did. I killed people who were defending themselves because we—the Amestrian military—were invading their home and murdering them. What you did was not at all morally equivalent to what I, the Colonel, and every other Amestrian soldier in Ishval did. However, that doesn’t mean you aren’t allowed to feel guilty or sad. Taking a life should never be easy. Feeling like this is what makes you different from Kimblee, or the Homunculus, or Envy.”

Edward twisted his left hand into the straps of the sling. It was a gesture Riza had seen him make before, though usually with his sleeve. “I may be different from them, but I still did something unforgivable.”

“Edward—”

“I mean that in the most literal sense. It’s impossible for the dead to come back to life. I certainly learned that lesson. And so a dead person can’t ever forgive you for killing them.” Years ago, the Colonel had told her that there was fire in Edward Elric’s eyes, but right now there was only steel.

Riza took a deep breath. She couldn’t make any mistakes here. “You’re right. You’re right that the dead can’t forgive. But you don’t need everyone’s forgiveness. When someone is causing as much harm as the Homunculus and will only continue to cause more, then everyone who can has a duty to do everything they can to stop them, up to the point of killing if necessary. That’s why you were fighting him in the first place, why we all were. And it was impossible to stop the Homunculus from murdering even more people without killing him. You can mourn the tragedy that another person had to die to end this, that there was no way to free the people of Xerxes other than by letting them have a true death. But while killing someone may be unforgivable, it can be justifiable, and in this case allowing him to murder more people would have been the worse crime. Or sin, I suppose. He was not only trying to kill you but millions more people. That’s not only self-defense, it was defense of so many others. I’m sorry that it had to be you. I wish it had been me or the Colonel or someone else who had killed before. I know you never wanted to take a life. But you don’t deserve this level of guilt. Remember the cost of taking a life, but you also need to remember all the people who are alive right now because of your action. They deserve at least as much of your attention as he does.” She hadn’t answered his question, told him how she dealt with killing, of course, but their situations really weren’t comparable. And shoving the part of you that’s screaming in endless horror deep underground until your hands don’t listen to it anymore was not something she ever wanted Edward Elric to do. She hoped this was a better answer. She hoped this would be enough that he could start healing.

He slumped down into the hard wooden hospital chair, letting out a long, drawn-out sigh. He sounded far too old and looked far too young. She had never forgotten that Edward had been a child through all of this, although perhaps now, after the Promised Day, it wasn't quite fair to call him that anymore.

“Hohenheim’s dead too. Granny called and said she found him in front of my mom’s grave. She didn’t even realize he’d arrived in Resembool. I guess he used up his philosopher’s stone in the battle. I wish he’d said goodbye to Al, at least.” His voice was measured and devoid of emotion.

She kept her voice similarly neutral, and asked “Edward, you’re sixteen now, aren’t you?”

“Huh?” He looked up from where he was staring at the floor, sitting up slightly straighter in his chair. “I mean, yeah, I had my birthday… before the Promised Day, but why do you ask?”

“I was sixteen when my father died, too.”

“Oh.” He looked distinctly awkward, probably expecting Riza to offer some kind of uncomfortable consolation based on an appeal to shared experiences of fatherly love. She had certainly gotten enough of those when she was his age.

“My father wasn’t really anything like what little I know of Hohenheim, aside from being an alchemist. He was the only family I had growing up. But I was angry when he died, for all the things he did and didn’t do, and relieved that I no longer had to be scared of him, and I also mourned the father he was in my earliest memories, the father I still wanted him to be. You do not have to feel only one thing about a father you had an unbearably complicated relationship with. You don’t have to cut off parts of yourself to fit into someone else’s idea of what mourning looks like.” It had been long enough that she could speak calmly about her father, now. That hadn’t been the case the last time she’d tried.

“...Thank you. I—I mean that. Really. He actually showed up again when I was in Xerxes. Ironic, right? I wish I’d asked him more about what Xerxes was like. By the time I actually wanted to talk to him more than I absolutely had to, it was too late. And I still don’t even know what I actually wanted from him. For years all I wanted was for him to never show up again and then he did and that’s still how I felt and then he apologized. I guess it turned out that was what I’d really wanted the whole time? Part of it, anyway. But I thought there was going to be something more after that. I was so focused on Al that I didn’t even realize this was it.” Edward paused awkwardly. “I’m sorry you were scared of your father. That’s not right or fair. And… I didn’t know he was an alchemist?”

“No, it wasn’t right. He was… obsessed, with his alchemy, and the obsession made him dangerous. To himself, as well.” She did not clarify who he was primarily dangerous towards. “And yes, he was an alchemist. The first Flame Alchemist, in fact, although he was never a State Alchemist.” It was, perhaps, ironic that she was telling this to the one alchemist she could be absolutely sure would never fall down her father’s path, the alchemist who gave up alchemy for the love of his family.

Edward opened his mouth, paused, closed his mouth, and then finally opened it again and spoke. “...Okay, so I guess I can’t _really_ make fun of the Colonel for not inventing his field of alchemy when I passed the State Alchemy Exam by using what was, admittedly, basically magic that I got from Truth.”

“And also trying to assassinate Bradley,” Riza couldn’t resist adding.

“And also _pretending_ to try to assassinate Bradley, but yeah,” Edward conceded. “I was twelve and have no idea why it seemed like a good idea. However in retrospect I think that we can agree I was justified. But if your father invented Flame Alchemy then why aren’t y—” He abruptly stopped speaking.

“Why am I not the Flame Alchemist?” Riza finished his thought gently. “The simple answer is that my father did not teach me alchemy, and unlike you and your brother I did not seek out another teacher. He took the Colonel on as a student when I was a child. But it is still ultimately my fault that Flame Alchemy was released into the world. I was the keeper of my father’s notes, and I chose to pass them on.”

“Bastard fathers sure make a habit out of not teaching their children alchemy, huh. Did… did you want him to teach you?” Edward looked up at her, and for a moment she saw her childhood self reflected in his unnervingly golden eyes.

“I did for... a long time. But as he became more and more obsessed with his research… eventually my father’s alchemy was something I wanted nothing to do with. I didn't realize how much having a student was keeping him stable until the Colonel left for the military academy, and by then it was too late. And in Ishval I saw the price innocents paid for the alchemy I was responsible for, and that put an end to any remaining childhood hopes of becoming a real alchemist.” She closed her eyes for a moment. If she was being honest with herself, she didn’t know what kept her from being a “real” alchemist beyond self-identification, but she could count the actual transmutations she had ever performed on one hand, and they had been in emergencies she thought about as little as possible. And never in front of any superior officer. Colonel Mustang knew, of course, but the military could not be trusted with alchemy. Anyway, that was beside the point of this conversation. “You wanted Hohenheim to teach you, I take it?”

“Yes,” said Edward, uncharacteristically quietly. “Well, after Mom was gone I didn’t even want to think about him. But before he left he spent all his time in his study, and I wanted nothing more than to know what he was doing. It seemed like… like alchemy was the only thing he paid attention to. When he left, he didn’t bring any of his books, so Al and I started teaching ourselves. We probably wouldn’t have stuck with it if our mom hadn’t told us she was proud of us for being so smart, though. And so by the time she died, we knew enough that I thought we’d be able to figure out human transmutation.” He let out a small laugh. “I may have been a smart kid, but I definitely wasn’t a wise one.” He paused again. “Maybe wiser now, though. I think I’ve finally figured out why he was so intent on studying alchemy day and night.”

“Oh?” Riza asked. She had eventually accepted that her own father hadn’t had any reason for his obsession. It was just the way he was, and there wasn’t anything she could have done to make him better. She did have some suspicions on why the Colonel had been an acceptable student and she had not, but she couldn’t have done anything about that either.

“I think he was trying to stop being immortal. After he showed up again in Resembool, Granny gave me my mom’s last message for him, because she forgot to tell him before he left. My mom promised him that she wouldn’t die before him, and she wanted him to know that she was sorry for breaking that promise. I spent most of my life thinking he didn’t care about her at all, and then he started crying at that.” He stopped, looking at his knees. “Anyway, Granny said that when he died, he was smiling in front of my mom’s grave. And the undying body wasn’t something he chose. I think he was scared of watching us all die and leave him. But, because he was an emotionally constipated bastard, he chose to leave us instead. It’s still being alone if you choose it, jerk. And then he finally started trying to act like a father, but it was too late.” Edward sighed loudly and leaned back in his chair. “Ugh. Sorry for dumping all this on you, Lieutenant. I know you’ve got your own stuff to deal with, what with the Colonel and everything. It’s just, I hate talking on the phone, and Teacher is out shopping for Al, and I’m absolutely not going to do anything to make him sad, and. Well. You’d talked to me before about Ishval, and then you mentioned your father, and…”

“And you needed someone to talk to. It’s alright. I’m glad you trust me enough to talk about this. And don’t worry about me and the Colonel. We can’t go back to how we were before, after the tunnels, but I think that ultimately our relationship will be strengthened. The crimes of my father were casting long shadows. And the Colonel’s own crimes, too. I’m grateful that you and Scar were there to keep him from falling entirely. However, today he’s not my problem. He wasn’t in the room when you came in because Lieutenant Havoc decided to make him try to get hold of his mother.”

“He has a _mother_? I just always figured he popped up out of thin air, manufactured by a bastard toy soldier factory or something.”

Riza barely restrained a laugh. Childish of her, she knew, but the mental image was too amusing. “And he’s exiled for the evening, too, because my friend Rebecca is resigning from the military today and then we’re making a date night out of it in celebration. We’re staying in the hospital room because I’m still not supposed to move my neck much.” Edward started to say something apologetic, but she stopped him. “Don’t worry, she won’t be here for an hour or so, you’re not inconveniencing us at all.”

He stretched in his chair and started getting up. “I still should probably get back to Al, though. It’s getting pretty late. Thank you for listening to me about all this. I really mean it.”

“You’re welcome, Edward, and goodnight.”

With a left-handed wave, Edward left the hospital room, visibly lighter on his feet than he’d been when he entered.


End file.
